Michigan Warriors goalie Trevor Gorsuch taking lead role as team seeks to save season

Michigan Warriors goalie Trevor Gorsuch, 18, has improved his play recently and is looking to lead the Warriors to a third straight playoff appearance.Lauren Justice | MLive.com

FLINT TOWNSHIP, MI -- Michigan Warriors goalie Trevor Gorsuch came into this season fresh off an 18th birthday and as one of the elder statesman on a roster among the youngest in the North American Hockey League.

Gorsuch, a St. Charles, Mizz. native, took his new found leadership role head on, but did so to a fault. He knew the Warriors were lacking not only in experience, but also in goal scoring ability, and felt a third-straight trip the NAHL playoffs would need to come as an exclusive result of outstanding goal tending.

“I felt like that was the expectation early on, to get a shutout every time I took the ice,” said Gorsuch, who came to Flint last year and won the starting goalie job by season’s end after splitting time with former goalie Branch Tiller. “This year there was different expectations with being one of the only veterans and returning guys. I think early on that’s why I was struggling. I tried to put too much pressure on myself to do too good, too early.”

As a result, he struggled. So did the team. The Warriors got off to a 3-13 start through the first two months of the season and are still trying to dig themselves out of that hole, currently in last place in the NAHL North Division with a 14-21-5 record.

Yet, Gorsuch’s play has steadily improved and the team has begun to turn its fortunes around. At the forefront of the Warriors recent uptick has been the improvement in Gorsuch’s performance as a goalie on the ice and leader off it.

“Ever since I’ve relaxed over this stretch of time I feel like I’ve started to get back into a groove and play better. I think that’s helped the team, too, because they’ve seen me relax and now the other guys are starting to do that as well,” Gorsuch said. “The guys knew I was a good goalie and I think it was hard for them to see me struggling early, so me calming down and getting it together I think has really helped everybody.”

Warriors coach Moe Mantha has seen the overall improvement and felt it was only a matter of time before his young team began to improve.

“The other thing that’s happening for Trevor is that we’ve also got a team in front of him that’s maturing now,” Mantha said. “One of the things at the beginning of the year is he put too much pressure on himself and he had to get back to controlling what he does. Trevor went through that experience last year of getting us to the playoffs and he knows how to handle the remaining games of this season for us.”

Michigan Warriors goalie Trevor Gorsuch blocks a shot during a playoff game last season against Port Huron.MLive.com file photo

With 20 games left to go in the regular season, the Warriors will need to play outstanding hockey down the stretch to avoid missing the playoffs for the first time since coming to Flint in 2010.

Mantha feels they have the attitude and growing confidence to make that happen.

“It’s getting fun for everybody right now,” Mantha said. “At the beginning of the year it wasn’t fun, but now we’re starting to show what we’re capable of.”

Gorsuch feels the team’s youth will be an advantage for the Warriors down the stretch and says he and his teammates have adopted a fearless mentality.

“We are a very young team, one of the youngest teams in the league, but the thing about younger teams is that at first we start out slow because we’re afraid to make mistakes. But once we get past that fear we become very dangerous and become a thorn in the side of other teams,” he said. “We’re becoming that team that never quits and always comes from behind.”

Another playoff run will take a come-from-behind effort of major proportions, but the Warriors have a guy in net that is prepared to see it through.

Contact Ross at rmaghiel@mlive.com and follow him on Twitter @Maghielse.